“It’s long overdue,” Martin Kpebu on depoliticising Police Council

Private legal practitioner, Martin Kpebu has called for the issue of depoliticising the Police Council to be revisited.

According to him, making the Police Council independent of executive control would facilitate effective policing.

“It is about time we revisit this issue of making the Police Council independent,” he said.

He added that Ghana needs constitutional reforms to make that happen, adding that the office of the Attorney-General should also be separated from the Ministry of Justice.

“…this is because, when the Attorney General is loyal to the President it is not easy to say he/she should prosecute party people” Mr. Kpebu argued.

Kpebu’s comments come after government bowed to public pressure to appoint an independent commission to look into the Ayawaso West Wuogon by-election violence.

Some victims including MP for Ningo Prampram, Sam George said police officers watched on while armed men suspected to be members of the governing New Patriotic Party (NPP)-aligned vigilante group, Invincible Forces, visited terror on them.

Following the disturbances, some groups questioned the independence of the police and raised doubts about their ability to carry out a credible investigation into the disturbances.

Police officers have consistently complained

The police have forever complained about the influence of political figures on their work.

The notable recent one being the widely circulated lecture of ACP Benjamin Agordzor.

ACP Benjamin Agordzor

The cop complained bitterly about the composition of the Police Council which virtually is made up entirely of the President’s appointee’s.

This, ACP Agordzor said makes the police answerable to the President and not the Constitution of Ghana since the President’s appointees serve at his pleasure and can be fired at any time.

He advocated the setting up of an independent council including an Inspector General of Police (IGP) with a fixed tenure and not one that would be an extension of the seat of government.